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How To Control Your Mac’s Fans

With great power comes great responsibility. That’s what every super hero hears from a wise old loved one or the one who granted powers to a new super hero. Yes, our Macs might be super hero computers, but Kryptonite exists and for the Mac it’s physics.

One aspect about the Mac that has always bothered me is the number of fans. The Mac Pro is down to one very large fan. The most noise you’ve ever heard from a Mac comes from the fan. What causes the Mac’s fan to begin bellowing? Physics.

Seriously, it could be something simple like a webpage full of blinking, animated Flash advertisements, or the CPU could be chewing it’s way through some kind of video or graphic complexity, or it could just be the direction of the wind. Sometimes there is no rhyme or reason to when a Mac’s fan decides to throw a hissy fit.

Enter the free Macs Fan Control app, the clever utility which monitors your Mac’s fans in real time– speed and temperature sensors. And not just monitor– control. Setup any constant value and control fan speeds in relation to the temperature sensors.

Look at all the geeky goodness you get to control.

You’ll see the number of fans and sensors in your Mac, and have the option to select specific components– CPU, hard disk drive, as well as the different fans associated with each.

Let me tell you– this can be fun. But with great pleasure comes great responsibility. Monkeying around with these controls may make your Mac perform even better.

Or, it might melt.

This free app gives you control over the temperature settings for each fan and sensor, or, just set it to automatic and let the Mac default back to what was making too much noise in the first place.

Get this– Macs Fan Control is so thoughtful and full of useful features that there’s a Windows version available for Windows running on a Mac using Boot Camp. If your MacBooks fans blast away for no apparent reason, Macs Fan Control becomes a good troubleshooting tool to find the culprit– whether an app that sucks up CPU capacity, or a few sensors that decided to go all wonky, you’re back in control.

And, notice the Windows version is called Macs Fan Control because it controls the Macs fans when you’re running Windows.

If you’ve never ever at any time heard your Mac’s fan come on then you’re probably not using your Mac to open up 17 apps at the same time, or trying to view 22 open Safari tabs, each with a Flash animation or video running in the background.

If you’ve ever heard your Mac’s screen go into a scream of pain it’s because physics have taken control of your favorite Apple device. Heat can be a mean beast to a computer and the fans usually come on to quell a nearly open flame. You can’t beat what you get with Macs Fan Control because it works and it’s free.